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The paper examines how qualitative feminist research can inform the study of engendered practices in organizational settings. It reviews current debates about feminist research, including Oakley's (1998, 2000) critique of the ways in which qualitative methods and data are used by feminists. The work of Skeggs (2001) on feminist principles for undertaking qualitative research is also examined, The paper then considers two pieces of research on work and engendered organizations that used mixed methods and data. Finally the paper considers some of the methodological challenges faced by the author in two recent qualitative projects about manager-academics. Using qualitative data, it is argued, does not necessarily restrict the wider policy applicability of the project findings. However, working in teams with those not committed to feminist research can present other challenges, which may also throw light on the phenomena being researched. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the central ways in which institutional racism is perpetuated is through the designation of the somatic norm. However, although the classed and gendered nature of the somatic norm underlying somataphobic representations of the universal 'individual' have been both theoretically and substantially explored, the racial character of this embodied being has received scant attention. This paper introduces race to the wider debates on the embodied nature of the political 'individual', before analysing the specific ways in which an institution that is deemed to be at the absolute apex of disembodied, neutral professionalism--the British senior civil service--is naturalised as the domain for white men. The somatic norm underlying the representation of the impartial senior civil service is brought to the fore in this paper by discussing the location of black senior civil servants, whose presence helps us to highlight the synchronic relationship between racialised bodies and elite spaces in the body politic. These 'Space Invaders' disturb the racialised nature of these spaces whilst at the same time adhering to the assimilative pressure of the somatic norm. An engagement with the interview accounts of black senior civil servants allows us to grasp some idea of what it is like for them to coexist in a place that is built on a 'racial contract' which has demarcated spaces in accordance with racialised corporealities. As matter out of place these 'different' bodies generate disorientation, undergo the burden of invisibility and abide by the racialised and classed informal rules of behaviour, particularly those of the legitimate language. All of which problematises the notion of 'difference' in organisations as entailing much more than the mere existence of 'different' bodies, on the basis of race or gender. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper's purpose is to highlight key sociological issues, that come to light when 'the body' becomes a theoretical site in reproductive genetics. By positioning the body as a central feature in this analysis, the paper: (1) describes how a mechanistic view of the body continues to be privileged in this discourse and the effects of this view; (2) examines how reproductive limits are practised on the gendered body through a feminised regime of reproductive asceticism and the discourse on shame; and (3) explores the social effects and limitations of reproductive genetics in relation to disability as a cultural representation of impaired bodies. The central assumptions concerning reproductive genetics are that it appears within surveillance medicine as part of a disciplinary process in society's creation of a genetic moral order, that it is mobilised by experts for the management of reproductive bodies and that it constructs a limited view of the body. Thus, the way reproductive genetics operates tends to hide the fact that what may appear as 'defective genes' is a result of a body's interaction not only with the environment but also gendered social practices valorised by difference as well as rigid definitions of health and illness. The research is from a 1995-96 European study of experts interviewed in four countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article emerges from a project that examines the relationship between forms of labour, in the context of managerially directed organisational and cultural change, in a light engineering firm on Tyneside. This material is situated within contemporary and historical accounts of workplace interaction. The paper will address the new emphasis on culture and its manipulation, that is increasingly forming a locus of interest in current literature. Whilst stressing that there is much in these accounts that was common in earlier writing the paper draws out what is distinctive about contemporary concerns. These issues are developed in the empirical account through an analysis of the manipulation of difference along the axes of gender, age and skill. The findings are located within a wider framework of the shift from post figurative to cofigurative culture. In this view there is a reworking of both the substantive relations between generations and in the form of relationships of age and gender. The result of this analysis is an account which, whilst stressing the radical change that has taken place nevertheless recognises that even the 'cleansed culture' is subject to contradictions stemming from the employment relationship. Further, that within the context of the social reproduction of the workplace, shopfloor experience is chronically implicated in the construction of autonomous cultures. As such the analysis provides a more positive interpretation of resistance to such change than that available in many recent accounts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the character of the debate about 'quantitative' and 'qualitative' methods in feminist social science. The 'paradigm argument' has been central to feminist social science methodology; the feminist case against 'malestream' methods and in favour of qualitative methods has paralleled other methodological arguments within social science against the unthinking adoption by social science of a natural science model of inquiry. The paper argues in favour of rehabilitating quantitative methods and integrating a range of methods in the task of creating an emancipatory social science. It draws on the history of social and natural science, suggesting that a social and historical understanding of ways of knowing gives us the problem not of gender and methodology, but of the gendering of methodology as itself a social construction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The tradition of thinking behind the idea of citizenship, which has become a key concept of modern social theory, has given insufficient attention to either gender or sexuality. In this paper it is argued that claims to citizenship status, at least in the West, are closely associated with the institutionalization of heterosexual, as well as male, privilege. This is demonstrated when the association of certain forms of citizenship status with heterosexuality, national identity for example, is threatened or challenged. In discussing the relationship between sexuality and citizenship, attention is focused on the implications for the social inclusion and exclusion of lesbians and gay men. The analysis shows how sexualized notions of citizenship are connected to the public/private divide at both institutional and personal levels. Finally, the paper raises wider questions about the implications of the discussion for theorizing citizenship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper argues that the transformation of the relationship between public and private spheres lies at the heart of the process of change in Eastern Europe, and that the exclusion of women and the de-grading of feminine identity currently in train are not contingent to, but rather a fundamentally constitutive feature of, the democratisation of Eastern Europe. This contrasts with existing accounts of social transition which have focused exclusively on the reconstruction of the public sphere. The paper characterises the changing nature of patriarchy in Eastern Europe, and explains why such changes have as yet not met with serious feminist challenge. It does so by highlighting the way in which the formal structures of state socialism acted to foster neo-traditionalism and traditional gender identity, and by showing how traditional gender identity has acted as a vital vehicle for change. Drawing on historical comparisons, it is argued that Eastern Europe's silent revolution may in fact be seen as a dramatic illustration of the masculinism at the heart of Western democracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the last decade, a significant body of feminist research has developed which has home-based reproduction as its focus. Strategically placed at the interface of sociology and social policy, this literature has had a significant impact on wider debates about everyday social reproduction. Yet, it has remained largely uncritiqued. Recognising the lack of critical debate, the paper reviews the way in which the concept of caring has been theorised within British feminist research. It suggests that caring has been typically defined by feminist researchers as the unpaid work of kin within the private domain of their family. Gender is seen as the dominant system of social relations which shapes the organisation of such care. Thus, rather than a broad structural analysis of everyday reproduction within families, most feminist research on caring has been restricted to one form of care (unpaid care by relatives) and one structural division (gender). The way in which racial and class divisions are embedded in everyday reproductive work has been largely eclipsed. Drawing on the critiques of Black women writers, the paper highlights forms of, and divisions within, home-based reproduction obscured in past and present feminist research on caring. It takes domestic service as a case-study which highlights how the social divisions of `race' and class, as well as gender, have been constituted through women's experiences of looking after families. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In all developed societies the class position that individuals come to occupy depends, inter alia, on their class origins, gender and ethnic group membership. It might be argued that these inequalities had 'meritocratic legitimation' if it transpired that they were largely the result of the differential distribution of merit across sexes, classes or ethnic groups. In this paper I address the question of how far Northern Ireland can be considered to be an educational meritocracy. In other words, to what extent might inequalities according to class origin, gender and ethnic group membership in the class positions that individuals attain be attributed, or legitimized, according to differences between classes, genders and ethnic groups in average educational attainment? The results suggest that in Northern Ireland, as in the cases of Britain (Marshall and Swift 1993; Breen and Goldthorpe, 1999, 2001) and the Republic of Ireland (Breen and Whelan, 1993), men and women and people from different class origins and ethnic groups experience different chances of gaining access to better class positions, even when they have the same level of educational attainment In seeking to explain the results of the analyses I draw on recent work that discusses and illustrates some of the difficulties with the concept of 'merit' and with the attempt to equate meritocracy with a diminishing role for ascription. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is based on a critical analysis of a chain of retail outlets called 'Girl Heaven', aimed primarily at 3-13-year-old girls, described variously as 'a piece of retail folklore' (Lumsden, 1999) and as 'Guardian Wimmin Hell' (Kettle, 1999). It argues that while on the one hand Girl Heaven appears to provide a celebratory social space in which girls can affirm their femininity, it also seems to epitomize the commercial appropriation of childhood femininity. As a way into exploring these two alternatives, this article is concerned initially with what it means to 'do' feminine childhood against the backdrop of contemporary consumer culture. It then outlines the methodological approach that we take to researching Girt Heaven, and the ways in which we explore young girls' lived experience of consumer culture and gender acquisition. We then consider the commercial context of Girl Heaven in rotation to the increasing market recognition of 'tweenies', as well as the significance of pester power and branding in childhood approaches to consumption. We subsequently focus on Girl Heaven as a cultural text, concentrating on its construction of femininity. Our analysis culminates in an attempt to reflect critically on the complex relationship between consumer culture and the process of becoming a woman. We reflect on Girt Heaven -- with which, our research suggests, young girls themselves are acutely aware of having a relationship that is far from straightforward -- as a notable manifestation of this complexity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a recent article in this journal, Andrew Sayer has argued that much feminist research on the gendered nature of organisations, such as bureaucracy and the market, confuses a contingent association of gender and organisational forms with a stronger claim that they are intrinsically gendered. Sayer accepts that this research has shown that the empirically found, concrete forms of organisations are gendered. However, deeper theoretical reflection, he suggests, reveals that, when considered as 'abstract realist models', bureaucracy and the market are, in fact, identity-blind. He makes two claims, one concerned with explanation, the other concerned with the political consequences of social inquiry. The first is that the construction of abstract models, rather than the 'associational' thinking concerned with the delineation of empirical regularities, is necessary to the proper understanding of the operation of causal mechanisms and their mode of determination in social life. The second is that this will enable a more progressive and positive politics beyond a fatalism which he attributes to associational thinking. This paper takes issue with both claims arguing that the abstract theory he defends has no positive role in social inquiry and that his political critique is misplaced. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper draws upon empirical research into the image consultancy industry in the United Kingdom. This industry is becoming increasingly important as a provider of knowledge and expertise to employers and individuals. We suggest that the literature on new forms of service employment (emotional labour and hybrid forms of work) has neglected to explore well-paid professional employees. We argue that this group is equally implicated in societal pressures to conform to conventional heterosexual images of femininity and masculinity. Pressures to conform do not have to come from management, but from professional bodies, the media and clients. Image consultancy provides one way of encouraging employees to alter their image as the advice can be packaged as independent of the employer and professional. We conclude that the new profession of image consultancy is more about gender than image. Consultants are selling codified knowledge for the construction of particularly socially accepted or preferred forms of bodily identity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses two important questions in the area of the division of domestic labour. Firstly, what change is observable in the patterns of men and women's time spent in domestic labour over the past twenty years, when taking into account structural factors such as employment patterns and social class? Secondly, among which groups of the population of couples can change be identified? One of the problems of this area of research has been that relatively few studies have systematically analysed change over time using directly comparable large-scale data. Here I present a detailed examination of the nature and pattern of change in the domestic division of labour among couples in Britain based on nationally representative time-use diary data collected in 1975, 1987 and 1997. The data are drawn from a cross-national data archive held by the Institute for Social and Economic Research at the University of Essex. Notwithstanding the fact that in 1997 women still performed the bulk of domestic work, it is found that, in relation to changes in time use in other areas of life, the increase in men's participation in domestic work (at least as measured in terms of time contributed) should be regarded as significant. In support of this, there had been (i) a reduction in gender inequality in the performance of some of the normatively feminine-associated tasks, (ii) a larger proportional increase in the time contributed to domestic work tasks by men from lower socio-economic strata, to a position of near equality with men from higher socio-economic positions, and (iii) a substantial increase in more 'egalitarian' couples. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recognising the importance of food preparation in divisions of domestic labour, this paper discusses influential literature on the gendering of domestic food preparation. It argues that findings from research on food preparation and food choice carried out in the late 1970s and early 1980s must be seen in their historical context, and outlines major structural changes since then which impact on women's roles. It also argues that the tendency of sociology of food research to focus on the cultural norm of the nuclear family with dependent children ignores more common household structures in Britain today. This is particularly inappropriate since there are a number of reasons why we should not expect men and women at this stage in the life course to be typical, in terms of food preparation and choice, of those at other stages in the life course. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper I examine changes in men and women's attitudes to sexual morality across nations and time. First, I use time-series data from British Social Attitudes and the General Social Survey of the United States to examine to what extent there has been a revolution in sexual attitudes and whether the change in attitudes has continued through to the 1990s. In particular, I investigate whether changes in permissiveness are mainly due to period effects or to cohort replacement. I also compare the trajectory and pace of change in the two countries. Second, I use data from the International Social Survey Programme to compare British and American attitudes with those of four other nations with very different sociopolitical and religious traditions--Ireland, Germany, Sweden and Poland. With the exception of attitudes to pre-marital sex, attitudes have not changed very dramatically over the past few decades. Attitudes towards homosexuality are becoming slowly more tolerant, especially among women, but condemnation of extra-marital sex has remained high. Religion plays an important role in explaining both within and cross-national variations in attitudes and provides a powerful counterbalance to permissive trends. I conclude that change has not been as revolutionary as is often claimed and the demise of traditional values is over-stated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper evaluates the use of the concept of 'diaspora' as an alternative way of thinking about transnational migration and ethnic relations to those ways that rely on 'race' and 'ethnicity'. It examines the heuristic potential of the concept, as a descriptive typological tool and as a social condition and societal process. Both approaches are described and key elements within each are assessed. It is argued that although very different in emphasis, and though containing different strengths and weaknesses, both approaches are problematised by their reliance on a notion of deterritorialised ethnicity which references the primordial bonds of 'homeland'. It is also argued that both approaches are unable to attend fully to 'intersectionality', that is to issues of class, gender and trans-ethnic alliances. It is concluded that although potentially enabling a broader sweep of questions that can relate to the transnational aspects of population movements and settlement, the concept of 'diaspora', as it has been articulated so far, does not overcome fully some of the problems identified with the 'ethnicity' problematic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper argues that the class legacy has had profoundly negative consequences for accounts of material gender inequality, and that even where gender theorists have attempted to move beyond class, they have been hampered by the fragments of class theory. It will be argued that whilst gender has posed a fundamental challenge to class analysis, the reconstructions which have been attempted have not escaped the central assumptions of class theory. The weakness of such reconstructions--hindered by flaws inherited from both the Marxian and neo-Weberian traditions of class analysis--has led some post-modern writers to question the very idea of a determinate, structural account of gender. At the time of writing, deconstruction--rather than reconstruction--is in the ascendent. However, whilst a structural account of gender can and should be defended, past attempts show that this cannot be achieved by clinging to the assumptions of class analysis, or by developing additive class-plus-gender explanations. Only those approaches which reject the economistic assumptions of class, by placing emphasis on the social space as a differentiated and determinate social whole, can overcome the limitations of current accounts of gender. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper questions recent attempts by feminists to move theory beyond patriarchy, addressing the charge by Pollert that the concept of patriarchy impoverishes analysis of gender and class. In place of patriarchy, the author advocates an alternative feminist historical materialist analysis of hegemonic practices as the means for excavating gender and class from lived experience. This mode of historical materialist theorising rejects the concept of patriarchy as unnecessarily abstract and unable to advance knowledge about the construction of gender in practice. A theory of practice can make sense of the mess of everyday life, and focus research on gendered bodies, spaces and experiences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper draws on empirical research into the recruitment, training, and management of female flight attendants, working primarily in the transatlantic business travel sector of the contemporary airline industry. We argue that whilst the 'skills' which flight attendants are required to deploy are denied, being treated as somehow inherent abilities and thus neither trained nor remunerated, they are nevertheless managed in a directive way. This management involves, in particular, a focus on a fright attendant's figure, and 'dieting'--what Naomi Wolf has referred to as 'the essence of contemporary femininity' (Wolf 1990:200)--as a recruitment, training and managerial strategy. The work of a female flight attendant involves adhering to culturally prescribed norms on femininity as well as organisational regulations governing her figure--its presentation and performance--whilst undertaking work which involves, at least in part, serving food to others. We conclude that this aspect of the work of flight attendants is thus 'a symbolic representation of the subordination of women ... a concrete expression of their position as servers and carers of men' (Charles and Kerr 1988:84). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper draws on data from a qualitative study of mothers' involvement in children's education in order to present a different perspective on gender and class from those embedded in contemporary dominant discourses on social class. It argues that class is a complicated mixture of the material, the discursive, psychological predispositions and sociological dispositions. As such, the ways in which class as a complex set of interrelated issues contributes to social inequalities are best understood by combining quantitative approaches to social class with more qualitative studies which attempt to explore how class, and the inequalities it generates, are lived in gendered and raced ways. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the potentialities and distinctiveness of a temporal perspective for analysing differences between and within genders. After a brief overview of sociological approaches to time, it suggests the value of 'an economy of time' framework for analysing work, especially those forms which involve no monetary exchange. Exchanges of time can be seen to establish their own reciprocities, inequalities and hierarchies, thus forming a wider basis for the analysis of social and gender division than one resting on a more narrow, say monetary, economic premise. The central sections attempt to demonstrate these points using oral history research on married women who began work in Lancashire during the inter-war years. Weavers and casual women workers are contrasted with respect to three dimensions of temporality: (1) the temporal structure of work/time in waged work, domestic labour and leisure, and exchanges of time between themselves and their husbands, employers and each other; (2) the temporality of life-course events and the structure of memory; and (3) the division between public and private. I argue that the findings (that the two groups differed systematically on all dimensions both in their use and subjective experience of time) have contemporary and conceptual implications extending beyond the particular case study, including a reconceptualisation of 'standard' working time and what constitutes 'economy'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Quite a lot is already known from the existing sociological literature about the overall time spent by women and men in different domestic tasks, but there is much less information available on more complex sociologically-relevant facets of the experience of time, such as the social context of activities, and the common combinations of different activities. In this paper I use time-use diary data to focus upon three important aspects of the gendered experience of time. These are the social context of domestic tasks in relation to their (gendered) patterns of management, the intensity or density of time-use involving combinations of different activities, and the fragmentation of leisure time according to which activities are responsible for interrupting it. Overall these analyses support the conclusion that women's time is not only more pressured in terms of the intensity of domestic tasks, but that the more enjoyable aspects of their time, such as leisure time, tend to be more fragmented than that of men. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the concept of 'patriarchy' as a tool for analysing gender inequality, while signalling the problems which arise from a common confusion between its use as short-hand description and as explanation. It first enters a substantive critique of a theory of 'patriarchy', highlighting its reductionism and circularity. It then broadens to the form of abstract structuralist theorisation used, and its flattening and mechanistic effect on analysis. As an alternative to a dualist approach to 'structures of' capitalism as 'patriarchy', it argues that gendering needs to be understood as integral to all social relations at the start. To unravel the mediations of this intermeshing, theory, rather than being abstract, needs to be embedded in the substantive empirical analysis of social process which might be called feminist historical materialism. The discussion finally considers why it is that a 'grand narrative' of 'patriarchy' survives amid the fashion of post-structuralist fragmentation, pointing to theoretical continuities of self-enclosed theorisation in abstract structuralism and in post-modernist sociology, as one dimension of explanation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Notwithstanding the growing numbers of women entering the professions and considerable public debate concerned with equal opportunity and barriers to women's advancement, attempts to theorise the relation between gender and profession within the discipline of sociology remain relatively rare. This paper draws on recent work on the gendering of organisation and bureaucracy to suggest that a key issue for consideration is not so much the exclusion of women from work defined as professional, but rather their routine inclusion in ill-defined support roles. This adjunct work of women, it is argued, facilitates the 'fleeting encounter' of professional practice, thereby resting on, and celebrating, a specific historical and cultural construction of masculinity and a masculinist vision of professional work. In an era where professions are under unprecedented public scrutiny, sociological attention to their renewal needs to recognise that a key feature of profession, as presently defined, is that it professes gender. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Equality with men in the world of paid work has been a major feminist objective. Given that work in the 'public' sphere has historically been shaped on the assumption that the 'worker' will be male, then national employment systems which facilitate masculine employment patterns (i.e. full-time work and unbroken employment careers) might be expected to be more likely to generate gender equality. This paper compares women's employment in France (where 'masculine' careers for women are common) and Britain (where part-time work and broken employment careers are more likely) at the macro, meso (occupational), and micro (individual) levels. The two occupations studied are finance and pharmacy. The evidence presented suggests that there are considerable similarities between women in the two countries at the occupational and individual level, despite national variations. In the light of this evidence, structural and individual explanations of women's employment behaviour are examined, and the continuing significance of structural constraint on the patterning of gender relations is emphasised. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper compares the nature and extent of change in gender-role attitudes in Britain with other nations. We hypothesise that while many of the changes would be similar across nations reflecting, in part, the increased importance of women's labour-force participation, the pace and sources of attitudinal change would be different in the different nations. Comparisons are made over the last decade between Britain, the United States and Germany. Using data from the International Social Survey Programme (ISSP) additional comparisons over a shorter time period are made with Ireland, the Netherlands and Italy. Data from the General Social Surveys of America (GSS) and Germany (ALLBUS) reveal that there has been a marked liberal shift in attitudes, with more of the change occurring within cohorts than through the process of cohort succession. In Britain, data from the British Social Attitudes surveys (BSA) reveal a slower and less consistent pace of change, with evidence of a growing gender difference in beliefs that maternal employment may be harmful to children. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is drawn from a study of the work and family experiences and aspirations of young adult women who were interviewed by either one or the other of the authors in 1992. A comparison can thus be drawn between interviews conducted by a man and those by a woman. This is attempted in a systematic and empirical way. The initial intention was to learn from the literature on gender and the interview to minimise the impact of the interviewer's gender on the data generated. In the first section this is reviewed and we put a case that this intention was achieved. This was, however, only to an extent, as we indicate with material on the revelation of abortion experience to the two interviewers. Whilst there was a similar pattern of response to our direct questions, there was a marked difference in the voluntary addition of further personal experience. The final evidence we deploy comes from re-interviews done in 1994 in which the interviewees were asked about their perception of the significance of the original interviewer's gender. This indicates the importance of interviewees' concepts of gender as well as the intentions of researchers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article responds to Ian Craib's critique of the present authors' paper in the May 1993 issue of Sociology which suggested the concept of gender stereotyped emotional behavior. The present authors relate that they would agree with Craib that much of cultural studies is merely a form of description which offers no clue as to the relationship between particular discourses and how people live their lives: some form of connection or identity between discourse and experience is usually implied but scarcely ever demonstrated. They note that in attempting to rubbish their suggestion of gender stereotyped emotional behavior, a number of sociologists including Craib have abandoned conventional sociological criteria and argued that because they personally know or know of individuals who are able to discuss their emotions the phenomenon cannot be widespread. They explain that their point is not essentialist, that all men cannot express intimate emotion but that--under the prevailing societal conditions of persistent gender inequalities of power and gender divisions of labor and emotion work--most men find themselves unable or unwilling or do not choose to do so in the context of close heterosexual relationships.

Gender has frequently been identified as the most controversial issue confronting class analysis. In this paper we make use of data from the Republic of Ireland to assess the extent to which the incorporation of women in class mobility analysis alters our understanding of the central processes of social mobility. We find that for married women their husband's class is a more powerful predictor of household poverty and life-style than their own 'class' as indicated by current or previous occupation. With regard to employment mobility we find that the sole source of gender variation in mobility chances relates to differences in the objective opportunity structures faced by men and women. Applying a measured variable model to 'men only' and 'complete' mobility tables reveals only modest differences in the patterns of social fluidity. The inclusion of women in class mobility tables requires little in the way of substantial modification of our understanding of the pattern of class relationships underlying the observed pattern of mobility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The welfare state has fostered a large volume of academic investigation but the core of its scholarship has been on the relationship between class forces and different systems of welfare. The possibility of a gender effect does not appear to have seriously troubled the minds of mainstream scholars in this domain. As a result, gender as a structuring principle of welfare systems remains under-explored. This paper undertakes a gender-focused analysis of a key aspect of welfare provision -- income maintenance policies. The British welfare state is a useful site of analysis -- at one stage an exemplary model of welfare provision, now a 'laggard' among its European neighbours. To identify the gender dimension of British income maintenance policies, we go back as far as the 1830s for the new Poor Law. From then we trace female and male access to welfare income, in the process considering how women and men have been constructed by public income-support policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The absence of gender from writings on citizenship, such as those of Marshall, Mann and Turner, causes problems for the understanding of citizenship. Debates as to how gender can be integrated into citizenship highlight major divergences in feminist theory over the relationship between the public and the private. The paper argues that citizenship cannot be understood without a dynamic theory of gender relations, and that political citizenship for women destabilises private patriarchy and the family. Citizenship is about a transition from private to public patriarchy, not only the civilising of capitalism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper takes issue with Elaine Showalter's claim in The Female Malady, that in nineteenth-century Britain madness was first and foremost a female condition. This claim appears to have become part of feminist orthodoxy, yet has little empirical support. In Showalter's study, the claim is presented as having dual grounding. First, it is based on a cursory discussion of statistics on the confinement of lunatics in nineteenth-century asylums. Second, it is based on an analysis of cultural representations of female insanity. I shall argue, however, that whether we look at the statistics on insanity or at cultural representations, neither provide evidence of any marked affinity between women and madness. Regrettably Showalter's claim, which is occasioned by her focus on women rather than on gender relations, is in danger of distorting rather than clarifying our understanding of women's madness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

European youth studies increasingly use critical modernisation theory to understand the changing social circumstances and cultural context of contemporary youth in advanced western societies. It is generally argued that the social biography of youth is taking a new form and meaning in the light of individualisation and destandardisation/destructuring processes. On the basis of data drawn from two recent studies of British and Dutch teenage girls, this paper argues that the relationships between youth and social change are more complex and fragmented than has been frequently implied. In particular, youth transitions continue to be marked by the effects of systematic social inequalities, such as gender relations, and these imply that gender-specific adult Normalbiographien remain of sociological and personal significance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the role of ideologies of love and intimacy in heterosexual coupledom, and examines the applicability of theories of the gender division of 'emotion work' to the field of intimate personal relationships. Research on the private sphere of the family has recently focused on quantifying instrumental aspects of relationships, such as financial management, the domestic division of labour and informal care. However, although fruitful, such approaches neglect the expressive or emotional; particularly the experiences of love and intimacy, which many people say they regard as a key element in their personal relationships. We suggest reasons for British sociology's neglect of what is almost a cliche in everyday discourse. And we present evidence (including preliminary findings from our own research on heterosexual couples) that -- despite dissatisfaction with gender inequalities in domestic tasks and finance -- many women express unhappiness primarily with what they perceive as men's unwillingness or incapacity to 'do' the emotional intimacy which appears to them necessary to sustain close heterosexual couple relationships. We illustrate how similar discussions of gender differences in emotional behaviour have emerged elsewhere (including in the new masculinity literature), raising questions about how far men's and women's emotional behaviour can and should change. The exploration of socially-regulated or 'managed' gender divisions in intimate emotional behaviour entails two related but distinct questions: are men and women equally 'susceptible' to the emotions or discourses of love and intimacy; and, do they handle such emotions in similar ways in the context of close personal relationships. We suggest how research findings on heterosexual couple relationships can be linked to work on the social regulation of emotion, which argues that there is a 'gender division of emotion work' where it is assumed that women will take responsibility for the... [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper seeks to challenge the marginal status of the body in sociology by examining the place of `the physical' in the production of social inequalities. After reviewing briefly Bourdieu's concept of embodied capital, I seek to extend his analysis by examining some recent work which looks at gender and the body-society relationship. It will be argued that a social analysis of the body is central to understanding the production of gender inequalities, and that sociologists should take more seriously the multiple ways in which bodies enter into the construction of social inequalities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article reports on trends in study of gender. The study of gender has come a long way since 1974. Most subsequent British Sociological Association conferences have had streams devoted to gender studies and the 1989 conference not only contained a specifically gender stream but a number of important papers discussing gender issues were to be found elsewhere in the program. The sociological interest in gender issues can also be seen in the explosion of research and publications on the subject, including several new and highly significant journals. This article briefly illustrates how such work has added significantly to the topics studied within sociology and offers significant opportunities for advance in theory and methodology. It argues however, that people should not regard gender issues as simply making up another sub-area of the discipline. Instead the study of gender is an important means through which sociology itself is being re-shaped. There are two main ways in which a concern with gender is altering the shape of empirical sociology. The first particularly characterized the early stages in the development of gender awareness. A second approach to studying gender has involved the introduction of new aspects of experience and activity as subjects for sociological scrutiny.